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This is the shirt we designed for the 10th edition of football cult festival ‘Bier en Ballen’. Our gift to all ‘Bier en Ballen’ volunteers and available in limited numbers, exclusively at the festival. Saturday, June 24, Breda – The Netherlands.
Bier en Ballen

This shirt is not available in our webshop, but can be ordered exclusively at the Bier & Ballen festival. All other COPA Football Shirts can be found on copafootball.com

In support of the Football Supporters’ Federation’s ‘Away Fans Matter’ campaign and inspired by a line from Herman Melville’s evocative 1851 masterpiece, Moby Dick, this design romantically portrays the unconditional devotion of the dedicated Away Fan, as a restless, driven adventurer.

The design presents a beautiful visual analogy for the extreme lengths that the Away Fan goes to; the incredibly arduous journeys, the ups and downs, the joy and the suffering… which, for most dedicated souls, is more often than not, the latter.

Away Fans ‘really do’ Matter. In an age of increasingly outrageous ticket prices, travelling costs and tough economic conditions, their support and enthusiasm is unwavering. They are the lifeblood of the game and bring considerable and much-needed revenue to clubs and local economies. Bringing noise, colour and character to football stadia, they are the catalyst to generating the unique atmospheres that have made watching the game so exciting, either as a live or televised experience. Football would certainly be less interesting and largely soulless place without them, so, bang the drum for Away Fans now and show your support for the FSF’s national campaign at:
www.fsf.org.uk/campaigns/away-fans

”As for me, I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts.’
Herman Melville, Moby-Dick

Virgin Media and disability charity Scope are teaming up to highlight disability discrimination in football grounds at Southampton’s game against Manchester United next week.

New research published today shows that disabled football fans feel excluded from live games. Eight in ten who attend football stadiums across the UK say they have experienced some form of discrimination or other issues resulting from their disability.

As a result, the majority (62%) of these disabled fans said these experiences had stopped them from going to a live match again.

To highlight the issue and to put disabled fans at the heart of the game, Southampton will wear a special Scope-branded shirt for their home match against Manchester United FC on Wednesday 17 May.

Virgin Media, the official shirt sponsor of Southampton FC, is removing its logo from the club’s strip to support its charity partner, Scope, in order to get behind disabled football fans.

It forms part of the company’s partnership with the charity to help transform the lives of disabled people.

Geoff is a former professional footballer. He recently sent me details of his awe-inspiring challenge for 2017.

“This year, I am taking on the “Three Tours Challenge”. This epic feat will see me cycle the three Grand Tours; The Giro D’Italia, Le Tour de France and La Vuelta a España consecutively.

This challenge is a monumental one. We will cycle a total of 10,504km, all in only 63 days of cycling just one day ahead of the likes of Chris Froome in the main professional events and I am delighted to have the support of Farr Vintners and my former team, Crystal Palace.

Only 39 professional cyclists have taken this challenge. No amateur or professional team or female cyclist has done it before and we would love a woman out there to join us. We are just 5 amateur cyclists who are passionate and driven to test ourselves to the limit for a great cause and this challenge will certainly take us to our limits and it is certainly for a wonderful cause.

Why are we doing it? We are trying to raise £1m to help blood cancer charity Cure Leukaemia fully fund the expansion of the internationally renowned Centre for Clinical Haematology. Not only will the expanded Centre immediately save more lives but it will also hasten global progress towards eradicating all forms of blood cancer within 25 years, a goal that we all want to reach even sooner.

We have had great support from so many already including the current England football manager Gareth Southgate. Gareth said:

“As a former teammate of Geoff’s I know what a brave and committed player he was and these qualities will have no doubt helped him through his own battle with blood cancer. His fundraising since he beat the disease has not only raised millions but also inspired so many people in the process. I am in no doubt that Geoff and the team will complete this monumental cycling challenge and raise considerable funds towards Cure Leukaemia’s £1m Appeal so I hope the football community will unite behind this wonderful cause.”

Please give what you can because every single penny will go towards a charity that can help cure the 3rd biggest cancer killer in the UK. Please help us Cure Leukaemia.

The tour started on May 4th in Italy, any donations would be greatly appreciated.”

Obviously, I could not pass on this newsletter I was sent today. You could say that it sort of had my name on it!

The Bike Project is an award-winning charity and social enterprise that refurbishes second-hand bikes for refugees in London. Refugees arrive in this country with nothing, are forced to live on a £36 per week and are not allowed to work.

13,500 asylum seekers flee to London each year. 27,500 bikes are abandoned over the same period. Just one of these abandoned bikes can help save a refugee £20 a week on bus fare. That’s £1040 a year!

The Bike Project sell the more valuable bikes that are donated through their online shop and rely on donations of second-hand bikes from members of the public to refurbish.

The ‘terão’ or urban field is an oasis in the Brazilian urban landscape and the place where family, friends, adults and children are cheering together for their local team. A breath of fresh air in the daily lives of those who live in the city outskirts of Sao Paulo.

These fields, the basis of Brazilian football as we know it, are increasingly rare to be seen because of property speculation and land occupation. Brazilian photographer Renato Stockler managed to catch a few of these last remaining typical fields in his beautiful serie ‘Grounds from above’.
The Ground From Above All Over T-shirt can be found on copafootball.com, in our flagshipstore in Amsterdam and via selected retailers and online resellers.

I came across this wonderful story about Isco (Francisco Román Alarcón Suárez) who plays for Real Madrid. Many years ago he lived down the road from me in Arroyo de la Miel (“The Stream of Honey”) on the Costa del Sol. He moved from Málaga CF where he made his name after being released by Valencia CF and has been a lynchpin in Zidane’s squad this season. As such I have always watched his progress. Many will know that I am myself sincerely “hearing impaired” which, apparently is the new politically-correct expression for what I really am ….deaf! I was therefore delighted to read this article in this week. #RespectIsco

Isco fulfills goal celebration promise to young fan in a big way

An encounter at an autograph signing leads to a lovely gesture

On Friday (14 April), Isco took part in an autograph signing that gave him the chance to meet eight-year-old Manar, who attended the event with her parents, who are deaf. As she got Isco’s autograph, she asked him if he could do the sign for “I love you” if he scored a goal in the next day’s match against Sporting Gijon. Isco told her that he would.
Fast forward to Saturday and just 17 minutes into the match, Isco scored and did the sign. But he wasn’t done. Isco then scored a 90th minute winner to beat Gijon 3–2 and did the sign again. After the match, he explained that he thought of Manar in those moments, prompting the gesture.

Making this whole thing even better is the fact that their encounter at the autograph signing was caught on camera. Take a look:

And as if all that wasn’t wonderful enough, now Isco even has his young son doing it (in a full Real Madrid kit, above).

Chris Smith has combined his passions for football and Lego, and has set about reconstructing all 92 English League grounds. So far he has built nearly half, including Manchester Utd’s Old Trafford, QPR’s Loftus Road and County Ground, home of Swindon Town.

He told 5 live: “I was surfing the internet one day and found that nobody had already embarked on this project so I thought I’d have a go at it myself.”

brickstand is the attempt to create all 92 league grounds from Lego bricks. It is now a live Kickstarter project where you can get involved in making this happen. Please follow this link for all the information